Review of Bad Boys for Life (2020) by Chrismizerak — 18 Jan 2020

In full honesty, I have not seen the original two installments in the “Bad Boys” film series. And even if I did, it would have only been a few bits at best as opposed to the whole duration. Although they starred Will Smith at the beginning of his rise to fame, I just never found it enough of a high priority to catch up with them in time for the recently released third installment titled “Bad Boys for Life”.

But what easily makes this third outing in the franchise the best film to be released so far in January, and the only one I’m recommending thus far, is that you don’t need to be well versed with the first two to follow what’s happening.

You could be in the same boat as I am and keep up with everything just fine. This is also a high compliment because this undercover cop buddy film genre usually is not my thing, and I still got into it.

It’s no masterpiece, but it doesn’t need to be. It does its own thing, and sticks to it. Will Smith and Martin Lawrence reprise their roles once again as two undercover cops in Miami. One of them (Lawrence) is about to raise a family with his wife and retire.

The other one (Smith) heals from a life-threatening gunshot injury and is seeking revenge on the people responsible. Both cops try to work out their differences on the matter to try helping each other out and solving the mystery behind their recent string of events.

They reluctantly get help in their endeavors from their police captain (Joe Pantoliano) along with a company called AMMO led by one of the duo’s ex-girlfriends (Paola Nunez). They also learn some concerning secrets about their past that may explain the connection between them and the person responsible for gunning them down.

The assets that “Bad Boys for Life” supplies are ultimately the reasons most people going into this will expect it to have and deliver on. The chemistry and dynamic back-and-forth between Smith and Lawrence being the easy target and for good reason.

They make a great team not just because they know what zingers to throw at each other, but also because of the reactions they have together with other characters present, namely the police captain and the ex-girlfriend.

The action, chases and shootouts aren’t bad either. They supply the necessary intensity and play with a little spontaneity once in a while. The film actually takes some rather bold risks in the plot that I didn’t think a film of its ilk would take, and I have to give them credit where it’s due.

Without said risks or twists, the plot is pretty bare bones and nothing to write home about. But usually, that comes with the territory for film within the cop buddy genre. It does lose steam in the third act which gets a little too implausible and caught up in its own chaos.

The pacing for the past two thirds was good enough that it kept things moving along well for the most part. Make no mistake, for a January release let alone a sequel to two films that weren’t generally well received by critics to turn out being a pretty good product (by said critics and someone like me who didn’t even see the first two), that alone is a fairly impressive accomplishment.